Koregaon Bhima-Elgar Parishad case : Pune police arrest Arun Ferriera,Vernon Gonsalves

PUNE: NP NEWS NETWORK- After the Pune special court rejected their bail application, the Pune city police on Friday evening arrested Arun Ferriera and Vernon Gonsalves. Sudha Bhardwaj will be arrested on Saturday. All them were in house arrest since August. They will be produced before a Pune court on Saturday.

Earlier in June police had arrested advocate Sudhir Gadling (49) of Nagpur, Sudhir Pralhad Dhawale (50) of Mumbai, Rona Jacob Wilson (47) of New Delhi,
Prof Dr. Shoma Sen (58) of Nagpur and Mahesh Sitaram Raut (31) of Nagpur. They are currently lodged in Yerwada Central Jail.

The police have informed the court the accused advocate Surendra Gadling and others are being prosecuted for very serious offence that they have provoked terrorism and responsible for communal tension in the State of Maharashtra. Due to their unlawful activities, violence occurred at Bhima-Koregaon and they have connections with Communist Part of India (Mao), the banned organization.

Elgar Parishad was organised on December 31, 2017, at Shaniwarwada, Pune, a day before the violence at Koregaon-Bhima on January 1,2018, during commemoration of 200 years of a war there.

According to police, the accused persons are facing prosecution under sections 153A, 505(1)(B), 117, 120B r/w section 34 of the Indian Penal Code and under sections 13, 16, 17, 18, 18B, 20, 38, 39 and 40 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967. Most of the accused are arrested in the month of June, 2018 on different dates and at present, they are in judicial custody.

None of them is on bail. As per section 167(2)(a)(i) and (ii) of Code of Criminal Procedure, the investigation of the offence is to be completed within 90 days if the investigation relates to the offence punishable with death, imprisonment for life or imprisonment for a term of not less than 10 years.